A number of years ago — I can’t quite put a date on it — I couldn’t sleep one night. It was around 3:00am, so I decided to go for a drive to clear my head and hopefully make myself tired. I drove around our area, but then I went out north a little and looped around OG Road. It was dark, cold, and wintry, and there were no other cars on the road.
As I was driving, I saw a pigeon in the middle of the road and slowed down. You know when you think if you just keep driving, they’ll fly off at the last minute? I think I had that mentality. But somehow… I hit it.
I was absolutely mortified.
I kept driving because I had to — all of a sudden there were a few other cars around — but then I looped back around to the same section of OG Road where I’d hit the poor pigeon. I couldn’t see it on the road, so I hadn’t run right over it. Then I looked to the left and saw it, puffed up and sitting in the gutter.
I pulled over and walked towards it. It started slowly walking away from me, but I could tell it was badly injured. I didn’t know what to do — I needed to help it, but I didn’t know how.
The first thing I did was take off my windcheater and try to throw it over the pigeon so I could scoop it up and put it in the back of my car. But it kept walking away — and from my end, it really freaked me out. It reminded me of when I used to go fishing with my dad as a kid. The way the fish would flap around always made me jump.
We danced a bit of a dance for a while. It kept walking quickly away, making it hard to catch. I decided I needed a box.
So I called Nanny.
It was 3:00 am and she wasn’t overly thrilled to hear from me. I told her I’d hit a pigeon and asked if I could come over to get a cardboard box. She got quite angry at me for driving around at that time of night, but she agreed to find one.
I went over to pick it up. She was almost in tears, begging me not to go back out. “It’s the middle of the night,” she said. “You never know who’s going to be around.” I told her I’d be quick, and that I’d be okay. Eventually, she let me go.
I went back to OG Road. My plan was to now throw the box over the pigeon’s head and catch it that way. It was clearly injured, but it had just enough steam in it to run away from me every time I approached. By this stage, we’d moved between two front yards on OG Road. Some cars were driving past — no one stopped, which I’m actually glad about. I’m not sure how I would have reacted.
I chased that pigeon around for a while until it ran under a parked car in someone’s driveway. That’s when I realised I needed help. I wasn’t keeping time, but it must have been at least 4:00 am by now.
I drove home and woke Mum up.
I told her I’d hit a “bird” on OG Road and needed her help to pick it up and take it to the vet. She swore a bit and was hesitant, but finally agreed. As she was getting dressed, I said, “Thank you so much for coming with me — I don’t want the pigeon to die.”
With those words, Mum turned around and gave me a death stare. She raised her voice and said, “A pigeon?! You got me out of bed at 4:00 am for a fucking pigeon?!”
I found her reaction fascinating. What if I’d said it was a parrot? Or an owl? Or a kookaburra? Would she have been more willing to help a more exotic bird?
I was a little disappointed. A life is a life — they’re all the same to me. But the irony of this story is that pigeons are incredibly special.
How about how they used to deliver messages in times of war? How about how they can find their way home from vast distances?
They’re evidence of intelligent design. I loved them then, and I love them now. I’ve even thought about joining a pigeon club — although in some circles they’re considered cruel.
Anyway, Mum and I headed back to OG Road. We stood in the front yard of the house where the pigeon had hidden under a car. It was so funny — my mother is a bit like Audrey Hepburn. Glamorous, a little bit posh, very professional. And there she was, crouched in a stranger’s front yard at the crack of dawn, trying to lure a pigeon out from under a car.
We realised the only way to get it out was to ask the owner to gently move their car. Since it was still very early, we left and came back at around 7:00 am. I knocked on the door of the apartment. A young Asian woman answered. I told her what had happened, and she looked at me like, “What the actual fuck?” But she moved the car, and said she had to catch a bus to uni.
By this stage, the beautiful little pigeon wasn’t looking too well. Mum was actually the one who put a towel around it, picked it up, and placed it gently in the box.
We then drove it to a vet that was open on Magill Road. I told the receptionist that in the box was a pigeon I’d accidentally hit on OG Road. She took the box away into another room. When she came back, I asked, “The pigeon’s going to be okay, isn’t he?”
She gave me a stern look and said, “No. It’s not.”
Mum dragged me away and we went home. I never called the vet to check what happened to my little feathered friend. I expect they put it down. Or it died. I felt so bad for hitting it — I honestly thought it would just fly away.
But the experience taught me something. With animals — as with people — some lives are seen as worth more than others. And pigeons, are right at the bottom of the barrel.
I told my brother what had happened, and he said, “What the fuck did you go to all that trouble for a sky rat?”
To my brother — and to my mother — it’s easy to dismiss a bird like a pigeon as a pest, or an incubator of disease. But they’re glorious. As are all birds.
And I celebrate the fact that people look down on them. Because what they don’t realise is — pigeons might be the most magnificent of them all.
Back in 2021, I became very interested in physics and astronomy. I was doing a course called the UPP at Adelaide Uni, which I’d enrolled in specifically to introduce myself to the sciences, an area I had no background in. Around the same time, I started hanging out at the Planetarium. I went to their public sessions as well as the school holiday ones.
That’s where I became close with one of the astronomers there — Mariah.
Mariah is a force of nature. She turned 50 last year and is hands down the smartest person I’ve ever met. She doesn’t have a formal degree, but she knows everything about astronomy and astrophysics and can name every star in the night sky. We started catching up outside the Planetarium and became good friends.
Mariah also had a friend she knew through astronomy circles named Neil. He was around 78 when I first met him and would be about 82 now. I’ve always believed friendships come in all shapes and sizes — age, gender, religion — none of it matters to me. Those differences should be celebrated when you're choosing who to share your life with.
But there was something a little off about Neil.
The three of us formed a bit of a friendship group, and some nights after Mariah’s sessions, we’d go back to Neil’s house and sit by the fire in the shed out the back. Neil told me that about five years earlier, his wife of nearly 50 years had just up and left. He talks a lot. Like, a lot — to the point where I actually think it’s rude. He’ll talk for an hour straight without pause or allowing anyone to respond or ask questions. My initial thought was, maybe his wife just got sick of it — literally woke up one morning and said, "I will not put up with this for one second longer."
But then I got to know him more. And my suspicions shifted.
One night, after sitting around the fire with Mariah at Neil’s place, she gave me a lift home. As we were leaving, Neil walked us to the car. We always hugged goodbye — there was usually love all around — but that night, after hugging Mariah, he hugged me and put his hand right on my bum and took a big grope. I could not believe it.
Maybe some people think a man of that age wouldn’t do something like that — but I was taken aback. Mariah adores Neil, reveres him even, so I decided not to tell her. I let it slide.
But the next time I saw him, he did it again.
It was audacious. It was blatant. It was cunning. And it made me feel sick.
The more I saw him, the more sexual he became. Once when I hugged him, he thrust his lower half into me. He’d hug me in a way that squished my breasts together and then press his whole body up against mine. It was revolting.
I used to take my friend Luna — who is currently in court for attempted murder — along with Neil and other astronomy friends to NightLab at the museum, an after-hours science party they sometimes hold on Friday nights. One night I was dressed up as a penguin, and the beak of the costume was flopping over my face. I asked Neil how I could get it to stay up, and he said, “I’m sure you could find a way to stiffen it up.”
Below you can see a photo of me in the penguin costume.
He made me feel so uncomfortable. He is, without a doubt, a sex pest.
That night, when I said goodbye, I felt obligated to hug him. A brief hug — but even then, he held my back firmly against his chest so he could feel my boobs. That was the moment I decided I’d had enough.
I started to distance myself. I stopped going to Mariah’s classes if I knew he’d be there. I didn’t go around to his house anymore. Gradually, I saw Mariah less and less.
One day, Luna and I were sitting out the front of Mariah’s house, waiting for her to get home. We were in my car, chatting. Luna said something like, “I love you and Mariah,” and I replied, “What about Neil — do you love him too?”
Luna paused. “I don’t know… what do you think of him?”
Before I could answer, they said, “I know what you’re going to say.”
Then they told me. He’d groped them too. He grabbed their bum when he hugged them. He lifted them up at the museum in a creepy way — something I actually saw and didn’t say anything about at the time. That’s on me. I should have spoken up. Luna is a very petite, younger, gender-diverse person, and it was my responsibility to look out for them.
They called Neil a predator.
They asked if I’d ever tell Mariah, and I said no. Because Mariah loves him. And:
a) I didn’t want to ruin Neil for her.
b) She might not believe me — and I’d be the one to lose a friend.
I haven’t said anything. Mariah has asked me a few times if Neil has done something to offend me, and I’ve always said no. But it fractured our friendship. We went from seeing each other constantly to hardly ever — all because of the risk of running into him and having to hug him.
I honestly believe Neil has sexually harassed or assaulted someone in the past. I wouldn’t be surprised if there are historical charges against him. Maybe that’s why his wife left.
I’m telling you all of this because, before I walked away from that little friendship group, I once told Mariah and Neil the pigeon story.
Neil responded with, “I expect you need to toughen up a bit.”
It’s funny, really — I should have toughened up and told him to fuck off. But all I could do was look at him and think, 'I don’t want one of you.' In that moment, I felt like I’d never want to be with a man again.
